Thoughts on downsizing in Newport

Sue Clark

The condo seemed so spacious when it was empty. My arthritic hands

and feet seemed so pain-free when I was hauling stuff up the stairs.

My friend, Dave, and his son, Matt, seemed so happy in the morning.

It was now late afternoon. The U-Haul truck was three hours late,

and I didn’t get their stern message, ( “we are reporting it stolen”)

because my cellphone was under a pile of clothes in my car. My little

dog, Wilson, would not go up or down the stairs, as he had come from

a four-bedroom, one-story house in Newport Heights. He would not “do

his business” out on some paper on the back balcony, because he was

afraid of falling off of it.

“What’s a balcony?” he queried, cocking his head.

Dave’s son, Matt, a former football player at Newport Harbor High

School, and coach of the winning freshman team last fall, lifted a

couch, popped it on top if his head and raced up the stairs with it.

He lifted the second couch and did the same.

When we got to my Mom’s cherry wood table, there was no more room.

Not for this family heirloom. Not for the green desk. Not for the

Papasan chair or my daughter’s stuffed animals. I was in denial, and

attempting to squash four rooms of furniture into two rooms. The math

wasn’t working.

“I’m sorry, but would you take the table back down the stairs? And

the books? And the chair? Do you want this painting?” I asked.

The move got a little quieter. It is one thing to bring things

upstairs and into a new place for a friend. It is another to bring

them back down.

When they left, I took my dog out, carried him down the dreaded

stairs and walked over to Pick Up Stix. I felt lonely and confused,

not grateful for selling my house and thus enabling an early

retirement.

I stared longingly at people strolling around Westcliff Plaza.

“Look at them,” I thought sadly. “They have normal lives, and don’t

have 15 boxes on the floor, a dog who is looking calculatingly at the

new carpet as a urinating opportunity. They know where their

coffeemaker is.”

As I dragged the dog back to the condo, I noticed that I still had

piles of clothes in my car. I looked like a carpetbagger. My dog was

busy marking every available bush and plant to establish ownership,

and when I tried to carry him up the stairs, along with a load of

clothes, I dropped the clothes down the stairs.

At that moment, Dave called to see how I was doing and I burst

into tears. “I’ll never get unpacked, and the dog won’t go up the

stairs, and I can’t find my phone and ... “

“I’ll be over tomorrow to help, and you can leave Wilson with me

this week while you’re at work,” he said. “It’s no problem.”

I started crying again, this time for such a friend.

Just then a neighbor walked up to me and introduced herself. She,

too, had a small dog. Wilson looked happy to see one more minuscule

than he was. Turns out she used to work for the Pilot in classifieds

early in the 1990s. “You’ll get it all done, and you’ll like it

here,” she said.

Another woman across the way, Judy, was starting her retirement

and loved it, and said, “Let me know if I can help with a cup of

tea.”

Thanking them -- before the tears started again -- I felt more

relaxed. The boxes don’t all have to be put away tonight. I found my

cellphone. And Adelphia is coming Thursday to fix the e-mail.

By summer, I’ll be fine.

* SUE CLARK is a Newport Beach resident and a soon-to-be retired

high school guidance counselor at Creekside High School in Irvine.